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Thursday, March 14, 2013

VA - The Essence of Swedish Progressive Music 1967 - 1979

Uncle Roddus New CD of The Week

Well, this wasn't going to be my review for my latest New CD for this week, it was suppose to be a John Zorn CD I have been enjoying all week. Also I was spose to go to the gym tonight after work and do some stuff in the garden, BUT Look what arrived in the mail box today and with Mrs. Roddus away in the city for the night, well what more could I do but slag off and blast this lot at neighbour annoying volume all evening.

I stumbled upon this box set on my Internet travels a few years ago and managed to find a version online to sample. I fell in love with this set very quickly but although still available to buy it was quite pricey due to there not being that many copies around and also I think it is out of print, so I burned it to CD and enjoyed it that way. When I start to like a release as much as this, I do really want to have a proper physical copy for my collection and so with a bit of spare cash this month I took the plunge and duly ordered it from Amazon, paying the princely sum of just over $60 per CD for this 4 disc set, Ouch!

So is it worth it, Well, Hell Yess! over 5 hours of 70's Swedish Progressive Guitar Wank, I'm in 7th heaven. Already being quite familiar with several fantastic tracks on this collection had made for an excellent evenings entertainment. This lot is just chocked full of great and quite often instantly memorable guitar riffing, with tracks ranging from Jazz-Rock to slower atmospheric folksy instrumentals, Floydian soundscapes, heavy psych and prog. I notice a strong Zappa presence as well as the afore mentioned Floyd and of course Hendrix. Many countries have very strong music scenes that go totally unnoticed out side of their borders and the Swedish scene of this period and this particular branch of rock is certainly outstanding, with most of these groups recordings being very rare. Although chock full of melodies and some great vocals, this music isn't the sort of thing that gets exposure on radio, mores the pity. Highly Recommended for any prog heads and gets a Roddus Rating of 5/5.

My vague memory was I found this set out in the web somewhere and Chuntao managed to track it down and post it on her blog.

Don't know what ever happened to her, I saw the blog was redesigned and the music wasn't free any more but could be purchased through itunes, not sure how legal it all was, but I now see it has completely gone from the web.

There was certainly some cool music to be found on that blog and many other blogs, so much so that I had hard drives full of music but not enough time to actually listen to any of it It is all gone now and I don't bother with MP3 files at all now except on my phone and in my work van. Since the purchase of my new high end Hifi system I only play lossless files through my excellent new DAC and they sound stunning.

The last couple of years I have been focusses on exploring the Tzadik records catalogue and some ECM stuff, and not to mention the vast Sun Ra collection I have built recently also. So Jazz has dominated my listening lately.

Any how since you asked, the main blogs I visit mostly nowadays are:

http://uncutjukebox.blogspot.co.nz/

http://nuvoid.blogspot.co.nz/

http://exystence.net/

and this site is very interesting:

http://www.dustandgrooves.com/

especially now i have a turntable again and have re-entered the world of vinyl.

About Me

Well, I dig Music of almost all variants, I love tramping/hiking in the Bush/Mountains. I enjoy reading, movies and growing my vege garden. I muck around on my computer a lot and I also follow sports a bit, especially Rugby and Cricket.